Canadian elections never end, they just move to the courtroom. But that doesn’t mean these legal battles aren’t without merit.

OTTAWA—The parallels with the Rob Ford follies may not be exactly precise, but our political battles have again moved into the forum of the black robes, high ceilings and wood-panelled walls.

The Toronto mayor blustered his way into a court and his current problems. The robocalls case, better described as the Conservative vote suppression case, being heard at Federal Court here, is much more complex.

It’s easy to see why some regard this as a worrisome trend (it gives me pause), this belief that elections are now being fought in courtrooms months after they were supposed to have been settled at the ballot box.

The arguments heard from those who support Ford and now the Conservatives are remarkably similar. The left is vindictively trying to push the Toronto mayor from office over a picayune $3,150 and his good work for underprivileged youth.

The left-leaning Council of Canadians is trying to boost its profile and raise funds by bagging six Conservative MPs and in the process wasting the taxpayers’ dime on a case featuring eight Canadian voters, none of whom was even prevented from exercising their franchise.

But, in both cases, motives need not obscure the fact that there is “there” there — even though the Council lawyer has acknowledged there is “no smoking gun.”

The Conservatives are, of course, well within their rights (and probably wise) to cast light on the political motives behind the case and the political leanings of the Council.

But, in the adversarial world in which we live, it would be the biggest man-bites-dog story of 2012 if a Tory ally had reached out to those who allege voting day trickery to challenge Conservative victories in select ridings in 2011.

Conservative party lawyer Arthur Hamilton argued on Monday that the Council is using this court case as a fundraising windfall, that it had issued the appeal for the crusade and then induced the allegedly wronged voters to get on board rather than let these voters come of their own accord.

But is well documented in Canadian history that advocacy groups have regularly done what the Council is doing: use applicants to support a case it wants before the courts, paying the legal fees of the electors and protecting them from any court costs.

If such a tactic is coming now from the left, it is because in Ottawa and Toronto leaders of the right and centre-right are in power.

When a centre-left party was in power here, legal challenges came from the right, including one in the name of Stephen Harper on third-party advertising.

Federal Court judge Richard Mosley took issue with Hamilton’s claim that the voters should have proceeded on their own, within 30 days as stipulated under law, not under the umbrella of an organization that wants to “sink the Harper agenda,” as it claims on its website.

A phone call directing someone to a fictional voting place could be considered a strange event, but it couldn’t be considered part of an orchestrated campaign until reports surfaced indicating its prevalence, Mosley said.

Otherwise, Mosley asked, did Hamilton really expect the affected voters to hang up the phone, acquaint themselves with the germane section of the Elections Act and start putting away money to hire a lawyer and head to court?

In our society, it is imperative that there are organizations providing the wherewithal needed, both financially and in legal expertise, for a citizen who wants to challenge a government.

The Council, incidentally, claims it has raised $300,000 to fight this case, about half of its anticipated legal costs.

The Conservative lawyer also tried to discredit pollster Frank Graves — whose data is crucial to this case — as a serial Liberal donor who fraudulently calls himself “doctor” (a mistake by a staffer Graves says he corrected).

Hamilton introduced a series of quotes from Maude Barlow of the Council that were meant to indicate she was ashamed to be a Canadian.

Council lawyer Steven Shrybman countered Tuesday that his eight applicants were there to recover the democratic rights for those who had them stolen in May 2011.

“A direct assault has taken place on the first building block of the democratic society: the right to vote,’’ he said.

As in most political battles, the truth lies somewhere between the utterances of the combatant lawyers.

Vote suppression is a huge mountain to climb. Overturning six elections likely requires much more than what Mosley has before him this week.

But no one should think this will put the matter to rest. Elections Canada says it is investigating questionable tactics in 56 of the country’s 308 ridings.

Tim Harper is a national affairs writer. His column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. tharper@thestar.ca

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